The Perry City Council received highly competitive bids on several recent city projects and awarded contracts at 35 percent and 40 percent below the cost for the work estimated by the city’s engineering consultant.
At its meeting Monday night, the council awarded the contract for the Park Street widening project to Harland Concrete of Perry, with its bid of $67,840 for the job. Harland’s bid was about 35 percent below the engineer’s estimate of $105,000 for the work.
T K Concrete Inc. of Pella was the only other bidder for the Park Street at about $92,000.
In the Park Street widening project, the city is partnering with the Dallas County Secondary Roads Department to widen and resurface Park Street westward of W. Third Street. The portion lying wholly within the city limits runs from W. Third Street to about where McLuen Street would intersect Park Street if McLuen Street continued northward from Cherry Street.
The next quarter mile westward, which includes the bridge over Frog Creek, is shared by the city and county, and the Dallas County Secondary Roads Department has already ground off the curbstone lips on the paved portion of Park Street west of the Perry city limit. The city will now follow suit in the coordinated plan to widen and resurface the paved roadway starting in July.
An even greater proportional savings came to the city in April, when the council awarded the contract for the widening of the Wiese Park walking trail to Landals Concrete of Perry. The construction company’s bid of $42,555 was 40 percent below the engineer’s estimate of $70,000 for the work.
Eight other bids were received for the Wiese Park project, ranging from a bid of about $53,000 from Howrey Construction of Rockwell City to the Concrete Professionals of Altoona bid at about $130,000.
The widened Wiese Park path will eventually become part of the connector trail between the Raccoon River Valley Trail and the High Trestle Trail, which is expected to carry a high volume of bicycle traffic to the downtown Perry trailhead via Wiese Park.
The council’s good fortune in pricing its projects started in February, when the city awarded to a Perry lawn care and landscaping business the contract for seeding part of the Pattee Park soccer complex. No Lawn Left Behind’s competitive quote of $15,654.80 was 34 percent below the engineer’s estimate of $23,847.50 for the work.
A quote of about $37,000 was received from North Central Turf of Webster City. Soil-Tek of Grimes submitted a quote of $50,000, and JM Lawn and Landscape of Ames made a quote of $80,000.
JM Lawn and Landscape received $27,000 to complete work begun two years ago but never finished by Spring Lake Construction. Protracted negotiations led to a mutual release and settlement agreement between the city of Perry, Springlake Construction and Merchants Bonding Co.
The terms of the agreement saw the city keep about $53,000 in retainage from the project’s original budget, with Spring Lake repaying an additional $54,442 for the unfinished work.
I bet the engineering services never come in below budget, but then again you would have to bid that out too.